In Mediterranean Catholic culture, and particularly in the islands such as Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily, the Holy Week is a key focal point for the community. It is a time of crisis, of the midlife experience of darkness and death – a theme similar to one developed by Dante in his Divine Comedy. The Holy Week has other aspects as well: it is the time when spring is stirring up, a checkpoint for the community, and a moment to remember, evoke and confront pain and loss. It has a definite dramatic structure with narrative and meditative aspects – from the Palm Sunday gathering to the famous Lessons of Darkness (fourteen stations of the Via Crucis texts in connection with the Entombment and the Apocalypse) to the way up towards resurrection, sun and life. These rites, still present in anonymous chants passed down the generations by lay community members, originate in the Gregorian tradition. They testify to the continuity of the tradition in Latin culture and of its connection to the Orthodox world and pre-Christian cultures.

This work presentation is the direct result of practical research into this sonic and cultural phenomenon in the oral traditions of Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily, and into written sources, conducted under the guidance of French and Polish holders of the Gregorian tradition. Each of these songs is a picture, a milestone of our actual experience in medias res – a meeting, person, place or moment of research. Through them, we aim to present the superposition of old cultural forms and our existence as young contemporary practitioners.

In medias res is a group of practionners from Poland, Italy, Ukraine and France, led by Jean-François Favreau. In medias res is based in the Grotowski Institute, in collaboration with groups such as Teatr ZAR, Schola Gregorianna silesiensis, as well as traditional singers and confraternities…

This work started as a consequence of the first VoicEncounters meeting in 2010, entitled “The phenomenon of Latin confraternities”. It is presented now in Wrocław as a side event of the second edition of the VoicEncounters session focused on Armenian culture: “My silent sister”.

This presentation is dedicated to our masters in singing – and living : the Cunfraterna di a pieve di a Serra, Tempvs Fvgit (Corsica), the Confraternita Oratorio di Santa Croce and Cuncordu de Orosei (Sardinia), the singers of the archiconfraternity of Mussomeli and the lametatori of Montedoro (Sicily), the Schola Gregorianna Silesiensis (Wrocław), and individuals such as Jean-Charles Adami, Robert Pożarski, Jean-Etienne Langianni, Bernardu Pazzoni…

Jean F. Favreau

Journey through the Holy week

Landscape

1 – A Biasgina – corsican profane song (a paghjella), staging the seasonal migrations of the herd up to the mountains – which corresponds to the time of the Holy week (Pianellu)